


Locker Buddies

by Jaro (ARealSlimScotty)



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Fluff, For the most part, Freshman Year, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Jake sucks at art, M/M, Rich is an artist, Slow Burn, i'll add as i go - Freeform, it's all pre squip, pre squip
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-15
Updated: 2017-09-25
Packaged: 2018-12-30 03:31:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12099768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ARealSlimScotty/pseuds/Jaro
Summary: It was Freshman year and Rich was anything but cool. Turns out, the person who has the locker above him is Jake Dillinger. And Jake was coolness personified.Oops I suck at summaries.





	1. Chapter 1

Freshman year was going wonderfully so far. Rich had a whopping zero friends, a nonexistent social life, and pretty much everybody hated him. Well maybe it was only a few people that hated his guts, but they were the only people who seemed to notice him so it sure as hell felt like everyone. At least Rich had gotten some sort of system down. It was simple. Wake up, go to school, avoid people, go home, avoid dad, pass out, repeat.

He was walking to his locker, head low and eyes focused on the ground. His backpack was slung over one shoulder and a few books were in his hands. Rich didn't know who had the locker above him, and he didn't really want to find out either. That's just another person who could hate him. Normally they weren't there when he was, so he didn't have to deal with that.

But turns out, staring at the floor when you walk is a bad idea.

Rich smacked into somebody, before tripping onto the floor. He winced as he sat up. Shit. His books were scattered around the floor and a few papers had fallen out of his bag. He scrambled to grab them. "T-Thorry, I'm thorry I wasn't paying attention-" he stammered. He grimaced at the sound of his own voice. Stupid lisp. Why couldn't there be a good alternative to sorry?

"It's alright bro, here, are you okay?" Somebody said. They handed Rich the books that he hadn't picked up yet, and then offered their hand to help Rich up. Rich flinched at first but relaxed when he realized this person wasn't about to hit him. He hesitated before taking their hand, stumbling onto his feet.

"I'm fine don't wo-" Rich started, glancing up to see who had helped him. He immediately cut himself off because holy shit.

It was Jake. Jake Dillinger. Rich immediately looked down at the floor again, blushing. Jake was probably the coolest freshman and maybe one of the hottest guys in the whole school. And maybe he was the guy who Rich sort of had a crush on. Rich could handle staring at Jake from far away, but he honestly didn't think he had the social skills to talk to him.

"Sorry I didn't really see you walking there" Jake chuckled, looking down at Rich, "You're Rich, right? I think you have the locker under mine. Or next to mine. I can't really remember which"

Rich was dying. He's pretty sure that he'd rather deal with bullies than this, at least then he'd know what to do. "I-I uh.. I'm.. Yeah, I-I'm Rich... R-Rich Goranthki" he stuttered, smiling nervously. Jake was talking to him. Holy shit.

"I knew I remembered it right!" Jake grinned, "I think we have art together too, wanna walk there together dude?"

Okay so Rich wasn't dying. He was dead. He was dead and he was in heaven. He let go of Jake's hand, blushing and gave a shaky nod. He had no clue what to say. This was great. Jake wanted to walk with him, Jake knew his name. Rich was beaming. If only he had the social skills to do something other than stammer and stumble. He knelt down and opened his locker, shoving his books in before standing back up. Rich wobbled slightly for a bit before regaining his balance. His coordination wasn't the best, and it got worse when he was nervous. He was pretty fucking nervous right now.

Jake stood and waited for Rich, grinning. So maybe the little guy was cute? There was something about Rich that Jake found super endearing. He had this awkward charm to him.

“You ready?” Jake asked, motioning down the hallway. Rich nodded and started walking behind Jake. 

“Thank you for like… helping me with my s.. things” Rich shrugged. He purposefully avoiding saying ‘stuff’. He didn’t want Jake to get annoyed or anything, and his lisp was annoying. Well Rich thought it was annoying, and so did some dicks at their school. That was enough to make Rich try to hide it. He looked up at Jake and shot him a small smile.

Jake smiled back.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Art class woo

Turns out, Art wasn't any less boring with Jake there. Jake sat all the way across the fucking room from Rich. The walk there was pretty nice though. Rich learned that Jake did pretty much everything, that his favorite color was actually green, and that he was actually a huge dork.

Which made Rich think. What made Jake so cool any way? Once Rich managed to calm down and actually stutter his way through a conversation, he seemed like any other guy. Hell, he even seemed a little like Rich. Maybe it was his looks? It was probably his looks. Jake was so hot yet cute it should be illegal. That alone put him in a different bin from most people.

Rich idly sketched on his paper, not really listening to Mr.Reyes as he spoke. It was probably just the usual shit. They'd be doing some project and Rich would be ahead of the class because he seemed to be the only person who actually drew. He drew a little doodle of his persona, surrounded by a few different girls and guys. They were all smiling. At least he could draw himself with some friends.

Suddenly somebody sat down in the chair next to him, and Rich jumped. What did they want? Normally people didn't bother him in class. He looked up.

Oh. It was Jake. 

"H-Hey Jake.. Why are you over here? N-Not that I don't want you over here, i-it's just that your thpot is over there?" Rich stammered, pointing over to where Jake normally sat. Jake just grinned and set his stuff down, handing Rich two sheets of paper. 

"Mr. Reyes just assigned a project, we gotta do it in partners" Jake explained, "Like portraits or something? He's handing out the info now."

Rich looked across the room, and sure enough all the students had gathered into pairs as Mr. Reyes passed out papers. Once Rich got his paper he read it over.

The project itself was simple. All they had to do was draw two portraits of their partner. One of them had to be realistic. Just a picture of the other person, and nothing else. The other had to be more abstract and symbolic, it had to tell somthing about the other person.

"Now, today is going to be the only day you can work on it in class. It's due by the end of next week, so I hope you don't mind meeting up with your partner outside of school to work on it. You can use whatever supplies you want" Mr. Reyes said, looking down at his desk. It was obvious that he didn't like his job. "Now get to work."

The class broke out into chatter and Rich turned to Jake.

"W-We're going to have to meet at your place.. You can't uh.. Y-You can't come to my houthe, ever" Rich stuttered, looking away from Jake. He hoped that didn't sound too weird. The last thing Rich wanted was for Jake to see what his house was like. Or what his dad was like.

Jake nodded. "Yeah dude, it's chill. My parents are gone most of the time anyway. You can come over whenever" He smiled. He grabbed Rich's paper and scribbled his number onto it. "Here's my number so you can like, text me or something" 

Rich nodded, blushing lightly. He had Jake's number now. Didn't that mean they were friends? "I-I'm actually free after thchool today?" He shrugged, "If you even wanna work on it t-today"

"Yeah you can come over today" Jake nodded again, grabbing his pencil, "We should totally start working though.. Hold still..."

Rich did as he was told, holding still. He tried to pull some sort of face that might look okay for a portrait but it just felt awkward. Like most things he did, forcing a smile felt wrong. So he just pulled some weird half smile. It probably looked weird, but it didn't feel too weird. 

"Its just a sketch.. And please don't laugh, I'm bad at art" Jake said quietly after a bit. He showed Rich his paper.

It was terrible. Rich cracked a smiled, trying his best to contain laughter. He really didn't want to come off as rude but holy shit. Jake was terrible. 

"I-It looks fine dude" Rich giggled, covering his mouth, "You really captured m-my uh.. ugly.."

Jake laughed, "I know it sucks, but you don't need to call it ugly" he chuckled, faking offense. 

"I'm not calling it ugly, I'm thaying that you did a good job thowing how ugly I am" Rich grinned. He didn't even realize he was grinning, and it didn't feel weird or wrong at all. Smiles felt a lot better when they weren't forced.

Jake frowned. How in the world could somebody as cute as Rich think they were ugly? "You're not ugly, Rich" He smiled as he started to pack up his stuff. He missed the way Rich's face lit up with blush. The bell rang and he stood up. "See you after school dude!" He started to walk out the door, waving at Rich.

Rich waved back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that the chapters are so short so far!! They'll get longer as the story gets more interesting, I swear. Comments and kudos make my day, please leave them!!!

**Author's Note:**

> Edit: oops I messed up the posting a lot, fixed that. 
> 
> Comments and kudos mean the world to me, my Tumblr is @awkwardsprinkles if you wanna hmu there


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